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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23566798">Shook the Best When Your Love Was Home</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thesuncameouttoday/pseuds/Thesuncameouttoday'>Thesuncameouttoday</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Teen Wolf (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Beware of overwhelming amount of angst, During 3b, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Missing Scenes, Not Canon Compliant, Slow Romance, Spans between 18-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 19:21:52</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>7,039</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23566798</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thesuncameouttoday/pseuds/Thesuncameouttoday</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“Oh,” her hand falters on the doorknob, “Stiles?” she doesn’t know why she asks the question as if this is someone else who just happens to look like Stiles, but its already left her mouth.<br/>“Hey,” he sighs, alarmingly quiet to the ear.</p><p>Lydia’s still stinging eyes involuntarily drop to below his shoulders, the crisp and neatly ironed suit wrapping his form surprisingly well. If she wasn’t in the pits of despair, she thinks her stomach would flutter at the sight. It looks like he’s about to go to his graduation, the neatness of it all.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Lydia Martin/Stiles Stilinski</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>68</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Teen Wolf</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Shook the Best When Your Love Was Home</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>So twitter started talking about the show for no goddamn reason in February and it pushed me down the Teen Wolf spiral. More specifically, the season 3 spiral of course. So this is what came out of it.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>A S T R A Y</p><p>The red strings that are pinned to the walls are so tightly wound to the scissors stabbed into his bed. For some reason all she can think about is how much time and strength it must have taken him to create this chaos. </p><p>They look so eerie in the room, like blood spattered onto the soft blue paint on his walls. Gone are the pretty colours from his wall, gone are the specks of sanity in his thinking splayed in front of her. </p><p>In a way, it makes her almost feel comforted seeing the horror in Scott and Aiden’s eyes, seeing that it’s finally not her brain and her thoughts that are causing others to feel so troubled. Like she’s not the crazy one for once. But the second the feeling arrives it’s stung by the guilt at thinking such frivolous things. <em>He’s in pain</em>. <em>He’s lost.</em> She doesn’t need her banshee powers to know that. </p><p>“It’s the coldest night of the year,” Aiden sputters out in disbelief. </p><p>The word hypothermia pokes its way into the panic-driven discussion, reminding Lydia of a certain project she’d seen in eighth grade. The words and images were calculated and logical but that didn’t mean it didn’t make her shiver to her spine. The idea that you can feel yourself shutting down in a span of an hour, like a breaking machine, slowly descending into a stiff lifeless form…the oddly cut poster from the day never erased from her memory. </p><p>In an hour his shivers will go all the way to his core. In another half the pounding of his heart will turn into a gentle and shaking ebb. In another 5 minutes he’ll start getting more tired. He’ll have to keep himself awake. In another 5…</p><p>Lydia swallows thickly, grabbing Aiden’s arm as Scott and Isaac leave. She can’t chase him down, but she can at least try to use these cursed powers she has. Maybe she can even help. </p><p>To most, the chaos of Stiles Stilinski’s room would send them into a fit of frustration and disgust; flattened pizza boxes and loose socks stuck to his floor like paint, the walls covered inch to inch with nauseating crime scene photos and newspaper clippings as if it’s the inside of a serial killer’s mind. </p><p>She sees that feeling mirrored onto Aiden’s face as he scavenges the other corner of the room where balls of crumpled and lazily stacked papers lie. A layer of self-consciousness paints itself over her, as if his gaze is on her secret closet or something. </p><p>It irks her too for some reason, the judgement clear as day from his eyes to his sharp jaw. Lydia sinks her teeth carefully into her tongue as she brushes her fingers over wrinkly books, the immediate defense about to spill out of her mouth. <em>He’s busy. He’s worried,</em> she almost clips. Which is true, if she might say. In the past few months the combination of working his way to a passing grade in the classes he’d reasonably forgot about as he and the two people she cared about most were being sacrificed while attempting to make said sacrifice help prevent <em>their</em> parents from being sacrificed, had taken up most of his headspace to make a clean room below his thousands of priorities. </p><p>Before the end of the semester she had tried to- in the politest way possible- help him get his act back together is some sorts. They’d sat up one whole night, the history homework she had come to help him with long forgotten, as they chugged stale coffee from chipped mugs. Stiles fingers had almost cramped up when trying to keep pace with her words as she strolled through his room, pointing out task after task that he needed to accomplish with a single manicured nail. </p><p>Now looking around, Lydia sighs as she sees not a single one done yet. Not even the get-rid-of-the-wads-of-terrible-jewellery- one. </p><p>Her eyes trace the half-read history textbook on his windowsill when she hears a small huff of a chuckle. </p><p>“What?” she turns with her arms crossed, trying to suppress her irritation.</p><p>Aiden lifts a small frame up, grinning almost pitifully. Lydia’s heart drops as she sees the picture caged in it, the smaller of the hundreds of trees she had drawn carefully slipped into place. It reminds her of the night in her backyard she’d sat down in the throes of her insomnia, watching silently as the crumpled pages curled into embers on the wet grass. She was sure she’d burned them all. </p><p>“He really likes you,” Aiden snickers, shaking his head. </p><p>Her shoulders tighten as she shrugs, “Maybe…maybe he just really likes the drawing.” She says, not even convincing herself all the while wondering how the hell he’d managed to find one of them. </p><p>Aiden raises a brow, turning the black frame over. “<em>For, Lydia,”</em> he reads out dubiously.</p><p>She feels the flutter of her heart as she makes him put it away, a little breathless, a little annoyed. </p><p>It doesn’t go away for a while, the feeling, even when Sheriff Stilinski shouts at her in the cold basement or even when she watches them wheel his pale form into the hospital rooms, the bags under his eyes a deathly blue and purple. </p><p>T R E P I D A T I O N</p><p>She knows it’s not him. In her right of mind Lydia knows that the lifeless eyes that are staring at her from the top of the cracked and dusty stairs aren’t Stiles’s. She knows that when his breath brushes her neck, the <em>insatiable</em> hissing right to her spine. </p><p>“You’re nothing like him,” she sobs into the cold bars in front of her, her fallen tears making the rusty metal glisten, “you’re weak. You’re lifeless.”  </p><p>Void’s boney snicker tickles the skin of her ears as he presses his nose into the mess of tangled red, he already knows who she’s speaking about. The whiff of his sour stench makes her nauseas. “I’m everything he wants to be, everything he could be if he wasn’t afraid.” </p><p>“Being moral makes him a coward?” she huffs into the cold night. </p><p>“No, it makes him a fool. Anyone with intelligence knows that power doesn’t come from being good or bad, it comes from using your mind for yourself. It comes from putting yourself before every other person. It comes from the sweet sweet demise of others.” </p><p>He’s breathless for a second, the frail chest pressed against her shoulder constricting. His fingers dig into the flesh of her arm, like carved icicles pressing into meat. “Oh, if only your Stiles knew just how powerful he could be…if he just learned to not be Scott’s little dog for once. He could be the alpha; he could be it all.”</p><p>“Stop it,” she begs, hoping against hope that she can slip through this goddamn cage if she shakes it enough, “please you’re hurting me, you’re hurting me, let go!” </p><p>“Oh Lydia,” he pulls her closer instead, savouring the whimper she lets out as he lets out the smallest of a whispers, so cold on her face, “you could be powerful too.” </p><p>P A S S I N G</p><p>When the cold blade gnashes its way into Allison’s abdomen, she can feel it. Like a dull throb in her belly that slowly grows to tremors in her chest. It’s like poisonous ink has blotted into her veins, searing every surface of skin with a hissing sting and her body collapses onto Stiles’s limp legs. Her nails painfully digs into the rough cement walls, begging for it to hold her up, tether her before she wallows into nothing but ash. </p><p>
  <em>No, no, no you can’t leave you can’t. I thought you would listen, I thought you would hear. </em>
</p><p>Her name crawls its way out of her throat, booming right from her lungs as she screams and screams and shouts her beautiful name. The name that reminded her of her humanity, that reminded her of hope and perseverance and <em>good</em>. </p><p>The strength of Lydia’s scream makes the room shake, the thick pipes above her almost whimpering as they hold together for dear life. It makes her shredded throat sizzle into a burnt crisp as the last sound croak of her best friend’s name hisses out of her like a stream. </p><p>
  <em>Take me with you, don’t leave me alone. Please, please, please.</em>
</p><p>Lydia lets out a wheezing cough, curling her trembling arms around an unconscious Stiles, his skin colder and paler than solidified snow. She can feel her pounding heart against his calf, the way it slightly shifts his skin to the side, as if knowing that it holds no power to her grief. </p><p>If Allison were here she’d wrap her long and muscled arms around Lydia’s small form, almost lifting her into a cradle. If Allison were here, Lydia would be able to smell the faint scent of lilies and shredded silver on her. If Allison were here, she’d feel safe, not alone. She’d whisper as much too, the way she always does. <em>Oh Lydia, you’re not alone, you’ll never be alone.</em></p><p>Lydia suddenly paws at a lifeless Stiles desperately, needing the warmth, that love that is slowly seeping out of her heart, digging out of everything that made Lydia good, what Allison made her into with her kindness. She pats his face, sallow and sickly, before the lack of movement under his eyelids wracked a frustrated wail out of her. </p><p>“Stiles,” she weeps, shaking his shoulders, “wake up. I-I need you, please.” Her angry whispers become a chant as she manages to jostle his entire form in desperation. “Stiles!” she yells angrily before giving up, slumping onto his chest. </p><p>If the hallway hadn’t been so silent, maybe she wouldn’t have been able to hear his weak beating heart, and wouldn't have presumed him dead if it weren’t for the shallow movement on his throat. The slow thrum matches the drip-drop of water around them. <em>Drip. Thrum. Drop. Thrum</em>. </p><p>When it slowly ebbs, and her tears have plastered onto her cold face like gloss she feels…she finally feels nothing. It’s almost a relief. Like a wound finally enveloping its victim, stopping the heart yes, but as well the pain at the very least. </p><p>She wonders what they’re doing outside. Are they grieving for her best friend? Or are they rushing to get to the next piece of the chessboard, the bow and arrow already discarded in the corner? </p><p>It all numbs out. The ache of her raw throat, the sting of her heart, the trembling bones. Maybe it’s the cold or her exhaustion-she can’t tell at this point- but hell it feels good. It’s the closest to a balm that she can get, and she savours it all. This was how she was only a year ago and she feels like a fool for trying anything else, for trying to open her hollow heart to others. Look what it got her. <em>Look what it got you, you idiot.</em></p><p>Time passes and she thinks maybe they’ve forgotten her. The girl who knows too much, the liability. </p><p>Her head shifts because of something other than herself, and when Lydia lifts her eyes she realizes that Stiles has woken. She’d forgotten he was even there. </p><p>He shakily lets out a soft groan, blinking rapidly as he looks down both ways of the hallway before he realizes he has someone laying on him. </p><p>“Lydia?” Stiles shifts up against the wall, suddenly a bit more alert with confusion. “Lyds, what…” he stares down at her, at the way she isn’t moving. The panic blooms in his brown irises and his throat constricts, suddenly attempting to paw her near. </p><p>“Lydia, hey, hey,” he coughs slightly as he gathers her close, the effort palpable to both. “Lydia.” Stiles cups her wet cheeks, Adam’s apple bobbing nervously as he thumbs her, “Lydia, are you alright? What-what happened? What’s happening?”  </p><p>She takes him in through her sodden lashes. Takes the time to trace all the differences she can count in her head that separate him from Void; the warmth of his breath, the softness oh his palms on her face. <em>He’s not him</em>, she begs herself to remember as he continues to wrap her closer in his lap, <em>He’s Stiles, he’s Stiles.</em></p><p>She doesn’t answer him and after a good ten minutes he gives up, sighing shakily as he cradles her head onto the length of his neck. Coffee and leather. The scent still somehow hasn’t left him. </p><p>“It’s okay Lydia,” he murmurs, not convincing himself of her as he rocks them slowly, gently, “it’s alright, it’s gonna be okay.” </p><p><em>Is it?</em> She almost whispers against his throat. But she doesn’t because her body is so tired, and she doesn’t think she’ll be able to speak for days, the pain in her throat like gaping wounds from rabid slashes of a knife. </p><p>She watches as Isaac limps himself into the tunnel sometime later, head lolled upwards against Stiles’s leg as he listens to her friend’s soft and weeping words. She watches the life leave him as the arms that were once tight around her fall to his sides, skin now deathly pale. </p><p><em>No</em>, Stiles’s lips wobble out as he swallows thickly, then swallows again because he’s already cracking out a loud cry. <em>Not her</em>, he whispers so quietly that only she can hear. </p><p>It takes her a moment to realize that she’s wrapped her fingers around his forearm, tightly, almost viscerally. <em>It’s alright</em>, she wants to say to him, <em>it’s not you, it was never you</em>. </p><p>But all she can do is pulse her hand around him, only feeling a small flutter in her aching heart when his longer fingers wind into hers, holding on for dear life, holding onto his anchor. </p><p>G R I E V I N G</p><p>The whistling breeze makes the grass tickle her ankles as she sits cross-legged, hands playing with a single flower in her lap. It’s a Turk’s Cap Lily, Allison’s favourite flower. </p><p>She’d bought about two dozen that morning before the funeral, the mundaneness and comfort of simply going to a store to buy like vice for Lydia. She had taken her sweet time trolling through the vast array of flowers, letting her fingers brush the soft petals as she looked for the strongest of the bunch, the brightest, choosing to ignore her mother’s gentle but impatient whispers to hurry up. </p><p>There had only been a dozen or less people at the ceremony, but that was triple of what Aiden had gotten a few days ago. </p><p>That had only been her, Ethan, Derek, and Scott, sitting silently as his pyre became whispers of embers. </p><p>Allison’s was quiet as well, but it wasn’t as sad to watch. For a reason that may sound morbid Lydia was sure as she watched her best friend get rolled into the ground beside her deceased relatives that this was exactly what she would’ve wanted; all her loves, all her people, that’s it. </p><p>At some point she had given up standing and decided to simply sit by the freshly piled grass above her coffin, feeling Scott and Isaac’s knees brush hers as they did the same. Argent had left a while ago. </p><p>Eventually her mother got bored (fairly so) of sitting on a chair and left after Lydia’s insistence. She wanted to spend time with her friend, one last time before her skin collapsed into her skull and the soft dimples of her cheeks became decayed flesh. </p><p>Scott and Isaac didn’t speak as they sat by her, but she still found their palms open for her to clasp, the warmth and liveliness under their skin a reminder of what she was losing right before her tired eyes. </p><p>And when Scott eventually let it go and cracked out a whimpering sob, Lydia had pulled him into her lap, trying against hope that she could somehow replicate the soothing ways of Allison’s embrace, though it was impossible. Her palms ran up and down his suit-cladded back. She whispers the words, the words that always brought her back. She hopes she can bring him back, if only the slightest. <em>Oh Scott, you’re not alone, you’ll never be alone. </em></p><p>C O A L E S C I N G</p><p>Her fingers trace the tall silhouette in the frame. They took the picture only a few days after they’d met, the frame a bit blurry as they’d taken it after scarfing down pastries at a nearby patisserie. She used to bring people there to impress them on her vast knowledge of French culture (which she could justify to those beguiled by her sudden intelligence as a product of watching a lot of MasterChef) before sweetly but brutally being schooled by Allison who of course turned out to be from there. The thing was that though she had more knowledge than Lydia she never made her feel about it. She never made anyone feel bad for knowing less or more. </p><p>It makes Lydia almost smile, how small were they, how oblivious, yet she would kill to be back then. Oblivion gifts a lack of a burden. </p><p>The frame drops to her side on the bed as she picks up yet another, continuing the same actions methodically. She can hear Prada’s small paws pitter over the frail glass of the frames. That smile, that brightness, that light. </p><p>Lydia jolts when the doorbell suddenly rings, annoyance spiked. “Go away,” she murmurs into the quilt on her bed, waving it off as a surveryor. The expected silent isn’t met when the doorbell rings again, a bit slower than before. “Go away!” she yells quietly, hissing as the sound starts ringing in her head, blurring Allison’s image in her mind. </p><p>It rings again.</p><p>“Oh, fuck off,” she growls when her feet stomp down the stairs, ready to bark at whomever has a stick so far up their ass tonight. Her oversized sweater sways, the hem brushing her knees as she pulls the door open. </p><p>“When no one answers the door, I think it’s a clear enough sign that you should kindly fuck o-”</p><p>The words die in her throat when his freckled long neck comes into her line of vision. She follows them like constellations till she meets his eyes. </p><p>“Oh,” her hand falters on the doorknob, “Stiles?” she doesn’t know why she asks the question as if this is someone else who just happens to look like Stiles, but they’ve already left her mouth. </p><p>“Hey,” he sighs, alarmingly quiet to the ear. </p><p>Lydia’s still stinging eyes involuntarily drop to below his shoulders, the crisp and neatly ironed suit wrapping his form surprisingly well. If she wasn’t in the pits of despair, she thinks her stomach would flutter at the sight. It looks like he’s about to go to his graduation, the neatness of it all.  </p><p>“Hi,” she murmurs back, licking her dried lips. She forgot to put lip balm on, <em>she</em> forgot. </p><p>“You didn’t come.” The words aren’t accusatory or questioning. Simply a statement. </p><p>Stiles swallows with eyes kept on her, they’re red and watery now. </p><p>Niceties rush to her brain when her toes start prickling from the cold and she pulls the door open a bit wider, not knowing what to say but, “Come.” </p><p>He blinks, hesitant before stepping inside quickly. It’s then that she notices the way he’s strangling his fist around a bunch of flowers. Turk’s Cap Lilies. </p><p>Scott’s voice comes into her mind suddenly, remembering a long time ago when he softly laughed at her bewilderment at the gigantic blue box sitting by her house’s pool, the buzz-cutted boy who’d brought it in winded in the corner in a wrinkled dress shirt. <em>He notices things. More than most. More than needed sometimes</em>.</p><p>It’s odd that it feels like a new guest has come into her house instead of a person who’s literally fallen asleep on her bed multiple times now. She can tell he’s feeling the same because his broad shoulders are tightened and scrunched all the way to his ears. </p><p>“Uh, I don’t hear-” as if on cue her little monster comes tumbling down the steps, jumping into the lap that has already dipped down to her level like a ramp. “Hiya cutie,” Stiles slightly smiles into Prada’s soft fur, long fingers making their way up and down her small back. “Oh, you missed me huh?” he cracks a grin for a second when she yelps her excitement onto his face through tiny licks. </p><p>“Do you…” Lydia leans against the back of her couch, breathless for some reason as she asks, “You wanna come upstairs?” She’s not sure why it sounds so intimate, as if she’s inviting him into her bed rather than staying in the room he’s rushed into on many occasions without her even asking. </p><p>Stiles looks up, adjusting the flowers in his unoccupied hand as he picks Prada into his other, of course he feels it too. “Yeah-yeah sure.”</p><p>He takes two steps at a time as he goes up first, filling the silence with small coos to her pup. </p><p>She actually has to point towards her chair because he refuses to do anything but stand awkwardly in the middle of her room with a puppy in his hand, which makes her distressed on the edge of her mattress.  </p><p>They wait for the other to speak, meeting each other’s eyes for only a split of a second before staring off onto a random wall. After Prada has had her appetite of being pet satisfied she jumps off him, scattering down the halls outside her room. Stiles lets out a small yelp of a no as she leaves, biting inside his cheeks with nothing to do. </p><p>“Stiles.” Lydia sighs, tired of the tension. </p><p>It takes him a moment, but he eventually speaks, picking on the fresh petals of the flowers absentmindedly. “I’m sorry I didn’t come.” </p><p>She shrugs. “It’s okay.” </p><p>A nervous hand runs through his hair. “I threw up five times on the way there.” </p><p>“Two for me,” she quips dryly. “Surprising how much bile can be created when all you’ve had in a day is a single saltine cracker.” </p><p>His lips lift, nodding. “Yeah, surprising how only having water for three days can have the same affect.” </p><p>They both huff out of their noses, leaning back against their respective seats. </p><p>She’s been looking at him the entire time, yet he’s batted his gaze at her maybe twice, which is why when it finally sets on her face for more than a second her throat tightens. Does he know how quickly his eyes move? The way they shift like a metronome every other second to another region of her face as if it’s the size of a wall instead of a hand. </p><p>They finally stay on her eyes, maybe to distract her from the way his throat bobs. “It should’ve been me.” </p><p>He doesn’t say anything else, but she knows what he means. It pricks into her heart painfully as she shakes her head. “Don’t say that.” </p><p>“But I should have,” he says immediately, jaw tightened. “Not just because of…her. There were more than two Lydia, there-there were dozens. Dozens of people whose eyes rolled into the back of their heads because of me.” He isn’t crying but she can tell that’s probably because he’s exhausted his tear-ducts for the night.</p><p>Her fingers tighten, tempted to pull him near. “You’re not him.” </p><p>“I am, that was <em>me</em>, that was-”</p><p>“No,” she snaps, remembering those hollow eyes, the essence of death emanating from that…thing, “Stiles I would know. You’re not him, you’re nothing like him.” </p><p>“Yeah but he came from me,” he stabs a trembling finger into his own chest, “my weak fucking mind let that thing make me it’s host.” A pregnant pause. “she and Scott would never had let that happen to themselves. Never.” </p><p>There’s no will in her to fight, to slap him across his sad face to make him understand that he’s being ridiculous and foolish, trying to somehow equate that a magic force beyond their control holding a human like him hostage is in any way his fault. </p><p>So she extends her hand out.</p><p>Stiles roams his eyes from it to her face, clearing his throat as he slowly takes it, dropping the flowers onto his empty seat. She pulls him and herself to the floor of her bed, tugging until she can feel his thigh brush against hers by her side. </p><p>Long fingers tug into hers, shaking like a leaf as they dig into her bones. There’s a small joy in the matter of them being so warm finally, so unlike the corpse-like chill of only a few days ago. </p><p>“When I turned into the driveway of the cemetery I-” she can hear his throat tighten, “I saw Scott and Mr. Argent hugging. I saw Isaac, and Derek, and…you and I just-I just felt this immense sense of being out of place. Like I was intruding into a sacred place.” </p><p>Lydia thumbs the skin of his wrist’s bone. “You are part of her people.” It’s grammatically incorrect but that’s the only way she can ever describe the ones Allison loves. Her people, her pack. </p><p>He chuckles sadly, bringing their hands onto his bent knee. “We spoke maybe ten times in total. Oh, and I happened to cause her death.” </p><p>“You are important to Scott, so you are important to her. And you didn’t cause it.” She hesitates, not wanting to impart her private moment with Allison, but she can see the way his brooding eyes are looking at her floor. “You know she thinks the world of you, right?” </p><p>He meets her gaze, blinking with startlement at just how close they’re really sitting. “Really?”</p><p>“Mhm.” She licks her lips, following the trial of moles on his left cheek. “She was horrified when she heard of your sleep walking incident. She told me nights later how guilty she felt that it had chosen you instead of her. That you had to feel such a pain only because you were protecting your dad.” Her lips tilts upwards. “You know she thinks you don’t like her very much?” </p><p>“What?” his eyes widen, head cocked back. </p><p>“Well she rations a portion of Scott’s time.” </p><p>“Because he loved her,” he reasons, confused. </p><p>His face makes her giggle. “Yeah but you two aren’t just friends and she knows that. You-you’re brothers, and she never liked thinking that she was taking away one from the other.” </p><p>Stiles is stunned, silent as he keeps her gaze. “I never knew,” he says quietly, almost ashamed. </p><p>“She hasn’t even told Scott that, you know?” </p><p>He shakes his head, leaning it back onto the mattress. “I wish I’d spent more time with her. And I always assumed we’d eventually be…I just didn’t think this...”</p><p>“I know,” she murmurs, slumping her head to his level, “I know.” </p><p>“She loved you so much, Lyds.” There’s so much moroseness in his voice. </p><p>“I know.” Her eyes are welling. </p><p>And his gaze becomes what it used to be, when she used to veer her day around not being around him because his stare was so intense, so deep. His irises become molten, gleaming with a golden hue as if he’s staring at a bright star. She doesn’t feel like avoiding it anymore. </p><p>His throat bobs and he’s breathing again, head dipping into the mattress a bit more so he can face her on the floor. “I didn’t hear your mom,” he chooses to say instead of literally fifty things she wished he would. </p><p>Her lashes bat away, still feeling the depth of his on her. “She’s on a business trip.” </p><p>He doesn’t reply. Just watches her. Watches the way her chapped lips meet when she enunciates the ‘p’. </p><p>Restless, she adds, “She didn’t want to go, but I was starting to feel suffocated by how much she’d knock on my door. So, I basically begged her to leave and I guess she got the message.” </p><p>He’s still silent and she almost slaps his face to make him stop. </p><p>“You wanna make some food? I’m starving,” he says after another minute as if they had just finished homework, rising up before she can even answer. </p><p>He extends a hand for her fumbling form, jutting his chin. “C’mon.”</p><p>A P P R O X I M A T I N G</p><p>They make lasagna, working together side by side slowly as Stiles does all the tasks that don’t stain his shirt (she definitely doesn’t stare when he takes his jacket off, and most definitely doesn’t swallow her dry tongue when he unbuttons the top two buttons). Prada attempts to steal bits of pasta from Stiles, but enough of her scolding stops him. How he coddles the little monster. </p><p>Usually such a silence would unnerve Lydia and she’d put some loud music on to drown out of the void, but the sizzle of the pan and the slight inhale and exhale of his voice beside her brings a sense of tranquility into her life that has been missing for weeks, maybe months. </p><p>She feels bad as they eat their ridiculously big plates of the dish side-by-side on her bed because she can see the way he’s attempting to scarf it all down all the while trying not to destroy the suit his father had bought him (apparently the Sheriff has said that if he ruins them, he’d chuck all of Stiles’ shirts into a bin and burn them). </p><p>“I’d give you a shirt but,” she sighs, trying to remember if her mom had kept any of her dad’s clothes before he left. Though on second thought she thinks it would be a bit odd to see Stiles in her father’s clothes. </p><p>“No, I’m all good,” he says all the while looking miserably at the lasagna he can’t eat to his liking. </p><p>With a roll of her eyes she puts the plate down and stands up, pulling her sweater over her head. </p><p>“Lydia woah, I don’t need one <em>that</em>-” she cuts him off when he sees that she’s wearing a shirt and shorts underneath the thing. </p><p>Lydia glares with a raised brow, chucking the sweater at this face. “you think I’d casually take my clothes off so you can eat your lasagna like a five-year-old.”</p><p>He scoffs, “I don’t eat like a five-year-old! More…like a messy adult. Like a man who’s done a hardy day of work.” </p><p>“Like that’s any better,” she scowls, waiting for him to pull it over his head before sitting back down. </p><p>“Oof,” he giggles excitedly, pulling the long sleeve over his hands with a shiver, “this is <em>nice</em>.”</p><p>“Yeah and it better stay that way by tomorrow,” she threatens, vaguely realizing as she eats that she didn’t say ‘after the meal’. </p><p>If he notices, he doesn’t respond because he’s shrugging uncaringly as he digs his fork into the mountain of noodles, moaning into the headboard as he chomps down a large chunk. “Oh god, Lydia, we made really fucking good pasta.” </p><p>She rolls her eyes through the fluttering of her stomach. </p><p>H E S I T A T I N G</p><p>They finished eating and chose to wash the dishes together-extremely slow- in a way that usually drives Lydia up the wall but it seems like Stiles can’t stop seeing specks on the plates because just when he’s about to hand them over to her he’s saying ‘oops’ and vigorously scraping it down yet again. </p><p>Wordlessly they go back into her room and play cards, followed by a particularly vicious game of tic-tac-toe. So, when they hit the fifth round of the game Lydia understands that she has to ask the question eventually. </p><p>And she’s Lydia Martin, so she’s <em>not</em> going to be a baby about it.</p><p>Except that she is. </p><p>Stiles is shuffling the cards when she finally confesses. “I’m tired.” </p><p>Stiles pauses his hands. “Oh,” he murmurs, almost paralyzed as he doesn’t know what to do. “Okay.”</p><p>Do it. </p><p>
  <em>Do it. </em>
</p><p>“I have an extra toothbrush,” she says quietly instead, unable to move her gaze from his, waiting for him to fumble with an excuse to need to leave, so she can wallow in her embarrassment and loneliness with a bloated stomach. Her breath sits still.</p><p>“Oh.” He murmurs, swallowing thickly. And suddenly his face is back to normal, “I think you need one right now more than me.” </p><p>Her exhale is potent and loud, but she doesn’t care. She’s elated actually, feeling like she needs to dance like a madwoman as she pretends to huff at his dry joke. “Shut up, Stilinski.” </p><p>A D M I S S I O N</p><p>The line between their laid bodies feels basically like a brick wall to Lydia. She’s aware of her every moment, her every single movement that is anywhere near his, feeling like the smallest brush of herself on him is like licking the spot with her wet tongue. What is she, a fucking Victorian woman? </p><p>He’s lying on his back as well, which she knows means that he’s uncomfortable because his usually sleeping stance is burrowed into his pillow to the point that he can barely breathe. </p><p>Silence breaks when he huffs, muttering <em>fuck it</em>. In the dark she can see him suddenly rise up, startling her as she pretends like she can’t see him. </p><p>There’s a crumple of a fabric which she can tell is the sweater that thumps onto the floor as she watches his silhouette move down his chest before he’s peeling his dress shirt off. The hands that are resting on her blanket clench slightly as she sees the outline of his chest, glimmering from the glow of the moon outside her window. </p><p>He’s a beautiful man. He really is. The moon kisses the dips of his collarbones so smoothly as he wrestles with something. </p><p>The admiration only lasts until she hears a loud zipper, about to shout at him at what the <em>hell</em> does he thinks he is doing before the sweater is throw back over his long torso.</p><p>Oh. Oh. </p><p>Lydia shuts her eyes, swearing under her breath as the bed dips again. This time she can hear his face thump onto the pillow, an almost pleasant sigh escaping his lips.</p><p>Her eyes are about to close, assuming that he’s fallen asleep when she feels his hand come up to the edge of her pillow, picking on the seams of its case. </p><p>“I haven’t spoken to Scott in days,” he confesses softly, almost like a child saying that they can’t sleep to their parent. </p><p>Is she supposed to have heard it or was he talking to what he assumes is an asleep Lydia? It doesn’t matter because Lydia is already speaking. “Why?” It’s stupid because she knows the reasons, but she doesn’t think it’s her time to talk. </p><p>He’s silent again, picking on the seams a bit more aggressively. </p><p>“Call him in the morning,” she murmurs. It’s not as harsh as a command, but it’s also not just advice. </p><p>There’s a shaky inhale of breath. It’s so close. It’s closer than her mind can remember his voice being two seconds ago and Lydia’s body begins to prickle all over as she realizes he’s lying on her pillow as well now. </p><p>It’s so close, so warm against her face and cheek. If she squints enough she can almost decipher his face in the dark, and can see the way he’s blinking rapidly with sudden hesitation and careful movements. She can see the way he’s somehow managed to find her lips in the darkness, the way his lips are being licked every two seconds as he wrestles with his next choice of action, tracing his gaze onto the curve of her cupid’s bow. </p><p>A finger creeps its way up between their now brushing bodies as Lydia’s breath shallows, body frozen, feeling the pad of his thumb trace the same curve that his eyes just had on her lips. It dips to her bottom one, gentle like a paintbrush on a canvas as it reaches the other corner of her mouth. The feeling is almost painful, her face so hypersensitive to the smallest of movements of his thumb. </p><p>He nears closer, his long nose pushing against her stubby and small one- </p><p>She gasps at the slightest feeling of lips brushing hers, his hand moves to the length of her jaw. Was it just her imagination? She doesn’t know because she can’t think.</p><p>It takes her every ounce of control to not capture his lips with hers, to devour his face as she straddles his tall torso. She trembles with the resilience not to because he has to do it this time, she won’t. She won’t cross that boundary first. </p><p>“Oh, Lyds,” he murmurs. Her body is vibrating as he speaks, wet lips now lagging slightly as they brush against her dry ones. “Lydia,” he whispers breathlessly.</p><p>She feels them, she can, she can, just like all those weeks ago. He’s so close that she’s intoxicated by his scent, the headiness of its nearness making her almost dizzy.</p><p>And he suddenly moves away. </p><p>Her body prickles with pain, like stabbing needles all over her skin as she freezes, the shock rendering her into a statue-like position. </p><p>Stiles doesn’t move to the other pillow, but he shifts his head to the edge of hers. His trembling breath is so loud now, he isn’t pretending like he isn’t anymore. A hand slaps across his forehead violently as he gasps, cursing himself as she watches before her hooded eyes the tears slips down his face. They blot the fabric between them, dampening her cheek pressed against it as she feels her body regain feeling. </p><p>As it does, she immediately finds his face, rather harshly pulling him into her embrace, pressing his snotty face into the crook of her neck. “Shh…it’s okay,” she coos, feeling his body press against hers shamelessly as he curls inwards, paws her back and waist as he sobs. “It’s not, it’s not,” he wails so loudly and suddenly that it makes her ears ache. </p><p>“It’s fucked Lydia, I fucking did this,” Stiles sobs. </p><p>“No, no, no,” she chants, feeling her own tears slip into his dark curls as she brushes her fingers from his scalp to his back, distressed at the way his body is shivering against hers. “You’re here Stiles, you’re here, you’re alive. You’re good, Stiles, you’re so so good.” Her leg wraps around his trembling body, pulling him closer as she chants and murmurs and coos into his hair. He keeps shaking his head but at the very least he’s not yelling anymore, he’s crying softly hugging her tightly as he hiccups his way through each breath. </p><p>“Go to sleep Stiles,” Lydia whispers against his forehead. “Close your eyes. Close your eyes.” </p><p>Of course, he isn’t listening, his lashes tickling her neck as he blinks rapidly. So, she takes victory in the fact that he isn’t shaking as much. </p><p>“Every time I close my eyes I see her body being carried away that night.” </p><p>She sighs, blinking the last of the tears. “Me too.” </p><p>“I remember the way you looked at me that night.” His voice is so small. </p><p>Lydia frowns. “When?” </p><p>“Before they all came, when…the other me kept you hidden.” </p><p>Her stomach drops. “Oh.” </p><p>His fingers dig into her waist, the small of her back. “I remember…I remember the fear. This utter loathing and hating fear, looking right at me.” </p><p>“That wasn’t you,” she says for the umpteenth time. </p><p>“Do I ever remind you of him?” The moment he says it she can tell his brain has been wracking that question around for a while now. </p><p>“No,” she says immediately, truthfully. “Never Stiles, never.” </p><p>Stiles suddenly moves his head away, lifting it so if facing hers. His palm rests on her cheek again, a bit more desperate in its movements. “Would you tell me if I did?” </p><p>She swallows. “I would never. But if…if you did, I’d tell you. I’d tell you in a heartbeat.” </p><p>“Promise?”</p><p>She nods, confident that she’ll never have to fulfil it anyways. “I pinky promise.” She brings her finger up with a small smile. </p><p>His sudden and breathy laugh fans her face as he brings his own up, linking them together dramatically. “That’s a promise till our deaths Martin.” </p><p>“Of course,” she chuckles, “I don’t underestimate the power of a pinky, Stilinski.”</p><p>D E V O T I O N</p><p>She’s in the haze between being awake and asleep, the clouds between the two dimensions of earth and sky. He is too, she can tell by the lack of tremors moving her hand that is clasped into his. It’s a moment to savour, this time of genuine peace for both for once. A moment to breathe. </p><p>His thumb that methodically runs down her jaw stops, slowly, the limbo between sleep and awake making him move like jelly. “Lydia,” he murmurs, his lips that wear her lip balm brushing hers ever so softly. </p><p>“Stiles.”</p><p>Stiles so slowly presses his lips onto hers that it makes Lydia whimper, even half-asleep. It’s barely a scrape, a mere touch of lips, but her body blooms with pleasure at the feeling. She feels him exhale shakily as he repeats it on her cheek facing the air and her jaw, the stickiness of the balm like tattoos that will be engraved in her skin forever. </p><p>His head drops back onto the pillow, all effort to lift it now gone as he sighs, nudging her head onto the spot under his chin. His skin pricks with goosebumps as she lays a kiss on the length of soft skin there. </p><p>Stiles pushes his hand underneath the back of her shirt, dragging it up till his palm can feel her heartbeat, thrumming slowly beneath bones and spine. His hands are so warm, so full of life and love. So alive.</p><p>“Lyds?”</p><p>She can’t speak, sleep tugging her nearer and nearer its side. She mouths yes onto his neck instead. </p><p>“Good night.”  </p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I love Stydia so much. They were the first couple that I loved so much that my constant thoughts revolved around them and what will happen to them.<br/>It sucks how quickly I forgot about the show as I grew out of it but man, rewatching 3 hit me like a ton of bricks with nostalgia and so much fucking love for these idiots. I do think that 3a has the best Stydia scenes and that's not just because of the kiss (which,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,I can't I can't explain how much I love it) but because there's so much time spent with them! it's beautiful to see Lydia grow close to Stiles and consider him a friend.<br/>And if I had any complaints about 3b (which are the minuscule compared to the other ones after- lets be honest) is that after 18, Lydia and Stiles's story started fading away because of course, there are more pressing matters to deal when someone is possessed by an evil spirit.<br/>But the ache for more made me download Anchor (by Ed Tullett, which I listened to while writing this) which I've been listening to on repeat for days like a maniac, but that madness led me to begin writing. And though this would realistically never even happen in the episodes because this is a teen show about fucking werewolves, I'm a melodramatic human who loves to explore a character's sadness.<br/>So here you go lol.<br/>I know most people (me included) have forgotten how much we loved the show because the last season wasn't great-to say the very least amount of mean things- but I'd really recommend to try watching your favourite one again because man, the love I and many have for this show is otherworldly.<br/>Anyways, thank you for reading if you are, and I hope you're staying safe because the world sucks at the moment more than the usual.<br/>Love ya!!!!!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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